Archive for May, 2009

 

Stop Marriage Divorce Receives Highest Rating

Saturday, May 16th, 2009
Stop Marriage Divorce, just received a full, five star rating from the Review Place (www.ReviewPlace.com) for its superbly written guidebook to stopping divorce and saving your marriage.

Stop Marriage Divorce is proud to have received a 5 star rating from Review Place. “Stop Marriage Divorce offers an outstanding guide book that will not only bring your marriage back from the brink of divorce but will also show you how to maintain a healthy and loving relationship and get your mate addicted to you just like when you first fell in love,” said Tommy Zaltman, a spokesman for Stop Marriage Divorce.

Katie Zaltman, leading author of e-book “The Mastery’s Guide to Saving Your Marriage and Stopping Divorce”, has been a marriage counselor and relationship therapist for over thirty years. During this time she has met with over ten thousand couples and assisted them in saving their marriages. Katie along with a team of three other marriage counselors and relationship gurus has developed this essential guide book to rescuing a failing relationship and stopping divorce.

The team’s step-by-step guide contains different techniques that will bring immediate results including:

the missing key ingredient to save your marriage, how to resolve lingering conflicts, what men and women want in their marriage or relationships and the differences in thought patterns between successful and unsuccessful spouses.

“Our reviewers have thoroughly examined and checked all the services offered by Stop Marriage Divorce and are fully satisfied with their product. It is a wonderfully economical and time saving alternative to expensive and time consuming marriage counseling, and provides powerful & illuminating insights that cannot be found elsewhere,” said Andy West, of Review Place.

Review Place is a leading provider of editorial and consumer based reviews on thousands of products and services. Review Place rates and reviews everything from weight loss programs to employment services to online dating sites. Review Place’s goal is simple: they want to save you time and money by providing quality information on the issues that impact your life. For more information, visit www.ReviewPlace.com.

To find out more about Stop Marriage Divorce and other related services, including descriptions, testimonials, and product reviews, please visit Review Place’s Marriage Advice category by copying and pasting this link into your browser: http://www.reviewplace.com/cat-316-Marriage-Relationships–Marriage-Advice.html



By: Andy West

About the Author:

Andy West is a freelance writer and a marketing communications specialist for MediaChoice, Inc. MediaChoice is a search engine marketing company which owns and operates http://www.RatingZone.com and http://www.ReviewPlace.com



 

Best Relationship Books - Dating, Marriage And Relationship Books

Friday, May 15th, 2009
How do we know so much about our history, about science and technology, about how things work, about our human body, about our languages, about nature and about anything and everything? We know because all these information which becomes knowledge are shared by individuals, groups, organizations and governments. How do we share and maintain this knowledge. We record these knowledge in whatever media that are available at the period of time. Book is a very common and effective media to share our knowledge and now it is also available in digital form. Books are our knowledge bank and marriage and relationship books are very important Knowledge for our social wellbeing.

We are not born with knowledge. We are fed with knowledge. The unfortunate thing about certain knowledge is that we are not taught about it like mathematic, science, language but we only learn from observations or by trials and errors. Marriage and relationship is one knowledge that has to go through this path. Learning by observation seems to be less effective as there are not many good role models for such learning. Our rate of divorce is high and there are a lot of stress in our relationships and so we muddle around through trials and errors in sorting out our relationship or marriage.

Marriage and relationship books would be a good reference source for information. There are books written with different focus in the stages of a relationship. The relationship stages are example relationship initiation, relationship maintenance, relationship dissolution, marriage, divorce, love, sex and others. We can pick up information from marriage and relationship books for prevention or remedy purpose. It would be good if more people read such books for prevention purpose.

Marriage and relationship books are academic base and non academic base. Academic base are written more for the academic society for the advancement of the academic society. The work is more research and clinical base. Non academic base are written more for the society in general. The work can be based on professionals like psychologist and therapist, through their course of work interacting with clients, the experiences learn. The work can also be based on individual person experience relating how the individual has come across various experiences either their own or from friends.

Knowledge is knowledge. It is only information for you to make better decision. Use your judgment. If you need more information or help about marriage and relationship books, visit our web site for the best book and watch videos with great tips on relationship.

 



By: Richard Y.

About the Author:
(Copyright Richard Y.) For more info on
marriage and relationship books, visit our website at http://www.relationship-advice.info.



 

5 Things to Do Before You Even Think About Getting a Divorce

Friday, May 15th, 2009
5 Things to Do Before You Even Think about Divorce

Summary — There are a number of things you should do before you take any action on your divorce. These 5 things are critical if you blow it on one of these you may have really made a huge mistake.

There are many steps to take to protect yourself in a divorce. This article will get you started. Your best bet is to talk to a lawyer before you do anything.

1. Talk to a Marriage Counselor or other professional who may be able to help you save your marriage.

Even if you don’t think there’s hope for the marriage, “divorce counseling” can help you discover what went wrong, how to cope, and how to pick up the pieces and go on. Don’t wait for your spouse to participate. If you don’t know how to find a qualified counselor, our firm will be glad to recommend one or you can check out the directory of professionals at stayhappilymarried.com. Your employment, social or religious contacts might also provide leads.

2. Talk to an attorney before you do anything.

Even if you don’t end up hiring an attorney to handle your separation or divorce, you would be well advised to get as much information as you can before you even discuss divorce with your spouse. There’s a lot to know about divorce in North Carolina . . . our laws are complex and even the simplest situation can be very confusing to families already in distress. Actions you take now may very well affect the outcome of your divorce (see #3) and you need to understand your options ahead of time . . . not some time down the road when it may be too late to alter the outcome. Click here to find attorneys who are well versed in the intricacies of North Carolina divorce law.

3. Do not move out of the marital home without talking to an attorney first.

Leaving the house without a good reason may cause you to pay alimony or may result in your inability to collect alimony. If you leave the house, you may also be unable to return until after a court divides the property. This process might take more than a year. The best advice is to stay in the house until after you talk with an attorney unless your spouse is violent. If your spouse is violent, you must take all steps necessary to protect yourself and your children.

4. If you have been involved in any extramarital affairs, talk to a lawyer before you discuss this with your spouse or anyone else.

In this case, honesty may not be the best policy. In addition to the fact that adultery is illegal in some states, admission of an affair can have other dire consequences. If your spouse is a candidate for alimony, any illicit sexual behavior on your part (during the marriage . . . which includes the time you are separated) could end up costing you thousands in additional alimony payments.

5. Take concrete steps to safeguard your assets before you and your spouse begin discussing divorce.

One of these steps is to take possession of certain assets during separation, especially those assets you wish to be using, such as furniture and vehicles, and those assets that might be liquidated by your spouse, including precious gems and stones, other collectibles, cash, and bearer bonds.

Another self-protective step is to file what is known as a Lis Pendens in the Deeds Office of any county where you and/or your spouse own real property. The lis pendens puts third parties on notice of your claim to have an interest in the real estate against which the lis pendens is docketed. The lis pendens is basically a notice of pending litigation that may affect real property. A properly recorded and served lis pendens clouds the title to the property, preventing an effective sale of the property behind your back. The rules regarding a lis pendens contain very specific requirements, all of which are spelled out in section 1-116 and the following sections of the North Carolina General Statutes.

A third possible step to protect the assets of your marriage is to get an injunction restraining your spouse from transferring or otherwise disposing of any property covered by the restraining order. Your attorney can also use an injunction to get your separate property returned to you, where your separate property is in the possession of your spouse and the spouse refuses to give it to you. The equitable distribution statute also provides a means for you to obtain an interim distribution of marital property, pending a final resolution of the property matter. Such an interim allocation could, for instance, give you much needed funds on which to live.

Other protective measures you might consider in your divorce planning include: (1) protecting your own credit rating by freezing or closing joint cards and by blocking your spouse’s access to other joint credit such as a home equity loan; (2) closing joint bank accounts and opening accounts in your own, individual name; (3) changing the name of the responsible party on utility and other bills; and (4) spending where possible your spouse’s separate property first, marital property next, and your own separate property last.

While this list will help you get started on the right track, it is by no means a complete list of all the things you need to do and know if you are considering a divorce. For more information about the rights and duties of separating and divorcing husbands and wives visit one of our Raleigh divorce lawyers. You’ll find a complete law library, downloadable divorce forms, a legal fee calculator, a child support calculator, lists of professionals who can help you and stories from people just like you who have survived divorce.



By: Lee Rosen

About the Author:

Lee S. Rosen is a Board Certified Family Law Specialist and founder of Rosen Divorce in North Carolina. Rosen Divorce is the largest divorce firm in the Southeastern United States. For more information visit http://www.rosen.com



 

Children Of Divorce: The Shocking Statistics

Thursday, May 14th, 2009
Though no one should presume to understand the circumstances which lead to the decision to divorce, or indeed discount a couples reasoning for divorce, it is worth understanding and considering the statistical evidence which demonstrates the damage divorce can do to a family and child. It is up to a separating couple to identify when and where they can lessen the impact of divorce upon their children, and these statistics may go some way to helping them to identify those areas where children are most vulnerable.

Firstly, an unpleasant truth about marriage in the USA: Half of all marriages are expected to fail before a child reaches 18 (Fagan, Fitzgerald, Rector, The Effects of Divorce On America), and nearly one in four children will see their parents’ divorce twice before adulthood (Furstenberg, Peterson, Nord, and Zill, Life Course).

Now we will take a look at a statistical representation of the various emotional impacts of divorce.

American teenagers in single parent families and in blended families are three times more likely to need psychological help within a given year. (Peter Hill, Recent Advances in Selected Aspects of Adolescent Development, Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry 1993)

Unfortunately, when compared to children from homes disrupted by death, children from divorced homes have statistically more psychological problems. (Robert E. Emery, Marriage, Divorce and Children’s Adjustment, Sage Publications, 1988).

Children in divorced families have a greater risk of injury, asthma, headaches and speech defects than those from an un-separated family. (Dawson, Family Structure and Children’s Health and Well Being, National Health Interview Survey on Child Health, Journal of Marriage and the Family)

Sadly, following divorce, children are fifty percent more likely to develop health problems than two parent families. (Angel, Worobey, Single Motherhood and Children’s Health)

In regards to parenting statistics:

79.6% of custodial mothers receive a support award

29.9% of custodial fathers receive a support award.

46.9% of non-custodial mothers totally default on support.

26.9% of non-custodial fathers totally default on support.

[Technical Analysis Paper No. 42 - U.S. Dept. of Health and Human Services - Office of Income Security Policy]

But what do all these statistics add up to?

Children from fatherless homes are:

4.6 times more likely to commit suicide,

6.6 times to become teenage mothers,

24.3 times more likely to run away,

15.3 times more likely to have behavioural disorders,

6.3 times more likely to be in a state-operated institutions,

10.8 times more likely to commit rape,

6.6 times more likely to drop out of school,

15.3 times more likely to end up in prison while a teenager

(”Marriage: The Safest Place for Women and Children”, by Patrick F. Fagan and Kirk A. Johnson, Ph.D. Backgrounder #1535.)

These disturbing statistics go some way to highlighting the severe impact a poorly handled divorce and resulting separation can have on children.

The best way to handle a divorce effectively with limited lasting impact on yourself and your children, is to hire a family law specialist who will help to guide your family effectively through this difficult time that won’t have a lasting effect on you or your family.



By: Elijah James

About the Author:

We have a vast array of information and resources on the best Divorce Lawyer Attorney and Family Law experts on our newly established website www.webfamilylaw.com. Visit us today for more information.



 

The Myth Of The High Rate Of Divorce

Thursday, May 14th, 2009
This past year my wife and I celebrated our 25th anniversary. It is the second marriage for both of us and the relationship has only grown stronger over the years, teaching me more about love and trust and dependence then I ever imagined. Reaching this special “silver moment” spurred me to look around and think about the number of friends we have who also have great second marriages and led me to question the alleged statistic that 60+% of second marriages end in divorce. I also thought about how many friends we have who are still in their original marriages and appear to be very happy. Thus, I decided it was time to do some research on divorce rates.

In the process of preparing for this article, I learned what I had long suspected. The commonly quoted numbers are overstated myths, the more accurate numbers reflect complex factors, and that our society really has two very separate divorce rates, a lower rate (by half) for college-educated women who marry after the age of 25 and a much higher rate for poor, primarily minority women who marry before the age of 25 and do not have a college degree (most of the research focused on women; the little I read about men suggested similar outcomes).

The Statistics:

A false conclusion in the 1970s that half of all first marriages ended in divorce was based on the simple but completely wrong analysis of the marriage and divorce rates per 1000 people in the U.S. A similar abuse of statistical analysis led to the conclusion that 60% of all second marriages ended in divorce. These errors have had a profound impact on attitudes about marriage in our society and it is a terrible injustice that there wasn’t more of an effort to get accurate data (essentially only obtainable by following a significant number of couples over time and measure the outcomes) or that newer, more accurate and optimistic data isn’t being heavily reported in the media.

It is now clear that the divorce rate in first marriages probably peaked at about 40% for first marriages around 1980 and has been declining since to about 30% in the early 2000s. This is a dramatic difference. Rather than view marriage as a 50-50 shot in the dark it can be viewed as a having 70% likelihood of succeeding. But even to use that kind of generalization, i.e., one simple statistic for all marriages, grossly distorts what is actually going on.

The key is that the research shows that starting in the 1980s education, specifically a college degree for women, began to create a substantial divergence in marital outcomes, with the divorce rate for college-educated women dropping to about 20%, half the rate for non-college-educated women. Even this is more complex, since the non-college educated women marry younger and are poorer than their college grad peers. These two factors, age at marriage and income level, have strong relationships to divorce rates; the older the partners and the higher the income, the more likely the couple stays married. Obviously, getting a college degree is reflected in both these factors.

Thus, we reach an even more dramatic conclusion: That for college educated women who marry after the age of 25 and have established an independent source of income, the divorce rate is only 20%!

Of course, this has its flip side, that the women who marry younger and divorce more frequently are predominately Black and Hispanic women from poorer environments. The highest divorce rate, exceeding 50%, is for Black women in high poverty areas. These women clearly face extraordinary challenges and society would do well to find ways to reduce not just teen pregnancies but early marriages among the poor and develop programs that train and educate the poor, which will not only delay marriage but provide the educational and financial foundation that is required to increase the probability of a marriage being successful. Early marriage, early pregnancy, early divorce is a cycle of broken families that contributes significantly to maintaining poverty. The cost to our society is enormous.

Here is some additional data about divorce in first marriages before moving on to the limited data available about second marriages. Divorce rates are cumulative statistics, i.e., they don’t occur at a single moment in time but add up over the years of marriage and do so at different rates. After reviewing numerous sources, it appears that about 10% of all marriages end in divorce during the first five years and another 10% by the tenth year. Thus, half of all divorces are within the first ten years. (Keep in mind this is mixing the disparate college-non-college group rates.) The 30% divorce rate is not reached until the 18th year of marriage and the 40% rate is not reached until the 50th year of marriage! Thus, not only is the rate of divorce much lower than previously thought but at least half of all divorces occur within the first ten years and then the rate of divorce slows dramatically. Since the divorce rate for women married by 18 is 48% in the first ten years and that group, once again, is primarily poor, minority women, the rate for educated couples is much less during those first ten years.

No wonder the divorce rate in Massachusetts is the lowest in the country. We have the highest percentage of college graduates. That explains why I have so many first marriage friends!

Finding meaningful data about the divorce rates for second marriages was difficult. But knowing that the rate for first marriages has been grossly overstated and poorly understood for decades suggested a likely similar outcome for the data on second marriages. One report indicated that the divorce rate for remarried, white women is 15% after three years and 25% after five years. This ongoing study indicated a definite slowing of the rate over time but did not have enough years measured to draw more long-term conclusions. However, it did indicate that the same factors with first divorces were at play here. Age, education, and income levels were also highly correlated with the outcomes of second marriages. For example, women who remarried before the age of 25 had a very high divorce rate of 47%, while women who remarried over the age of 25 only had a divorce rate of 34%. The latter is actually about the same for first marriages and likely also would prove to be an average of different rates based socioeconomic factors. Thus, my take on this limited amount of data is that divorce rates for second marriages may not be very different than those for first marriages. So my small sample of friends, who remarried older, had college degrees, and joint incomes, is probably not a distorted view of the success rate of second marriages.

Cohabitation:

In the course of gathering information about divorce rates, I came across a few articles describing the growing frequency of couples choosing cohabitation over marriage. I don’t have any figures that I consider accurate enough to report on the percentage of cohabitating couples but a July 24, 2007 Boston Globe article on cohabitating parents sheds some light and raises some serious concerns about this trend.

I must admit a bias here. From my professional experience, I believe cohabitating couples are afraid of the commitment that marriage requires. Certainly a piece of this is what I stated at the beginning of this article, that the myth of the divorce rate has placed a dark cloud over the institution of marriage. The reason for my concern is the following data reported in the Globe article. There is a marked increase in births to cohabitating couples, up from 29% in the early 1980s to 53% in the late 1990s. When you compare what has happened to those relationships when the child is two years old, 30% of the cohabitating couples are no longer together while only 6% of the married couples are divorced. This is another serious societal problem as it contributes to the U.S. having the lowest rate of all Western countries, 63%, of children being raised by both biological parents.

In addition, the general data suggests that cohabitating couples break up at twice the rate of married couples. Of course, this kind of simple statistic hides many complex factors with regard to who actually constitutes the population of cohabitating couples and the likelihood that many choose to live together with no real intention of permanence. However, my main point here is the concern that many couples may be choosing cohabitation over marriage because they actually believe that the institution of marriage is unhealthy and too risky, a conclusion that my review of divorce rates strongly disputes.

Conclusion:

The historical belief that 50% of all marriages end in divorce and that over 60% of all second marriages end in divorce appears to be grossly overstated myths. Not only is the general divorce rate most likely to have never exceeded 40% but the current rate is probably closer to 30%. A closer look at even these lower rates indicate that there are really two separate groups with very different rates: a woman who is over 25, has a college degree, and an independent income have only a 20% probability of her marriage ending in divorce; a woman who marries younger than 25, without a college degree and lacking an independent income has a 40% probability of her marriage ending in divorce.

Thus, factors of age, education, and income appear to play a significant role in influencing the outcome of marriages and that for the older, more educated woman, getting married is not a crap shoot but, in fact, it is highly likely to produce a stable, lifelong relationship.



By: Kalman Heller

About the Author:
Dr. Heller is a clinical psychologist, now retired, who specialized in providing services to children, families, and couples since 1968. He has written over 150 columns about parenting and marriage which are available on his website, http://www.drheller.com.



 

Search Divorce Records Instantly Online

Thursday, May 14th, 2009
Are you looking for important divorce records on yourself or someone else? Perhaps you want to verify that your future spouse is really divorced from a previous marriage or maybe you are trying to check up on the identity of someone. Whatever the reasons you want to find divorce records, you can do so instantly online.

Divorce records are public information making them easily obtainable through public databases online. You can search from the ease and comfort of your own home by using your home computer. It’s quick, it’s efficient and it’s accurate. Any member of the public with access to the Internet can search for divorce records of someone else.

Free databases make it possible to do these searches without spending even a dime so don’t let money hold you back. If you want to check up on someone, validate an identity or past from someone you know or even get your own divorce records without going through a lot of red tape, you can do so instantly online.

Technology such as the Internet has now made many things easier for ordinary people like you and me. Web searches make it faster than ever to find important information you’re looking for but you may not have known that you can use it to search for public records such as marriage, divorce and death records.

In the past, searches of this type may have taken days to complete. You probably would have had to go into the office where the records are kept and you may have needed to provide information about why you wanted the records.

Today, it’s much simpler and you don’t have to reveal yourself or why you want the records so you have complete confidentiality when you search for these divorce records online. Searches that could have taken days or even weeks before can now be done in a matter of minutes. You could have your results almost immediately with an online search.

The statistics speak for themselves when you look at the many people and organizations that are turning to online divorce record searches. There are millions of records found in the databases and you can begin your search immediately. If you need to search for multiple records, this is also easier than ever before. You can perform multiple searches from the same records search database.

Good divorce record databases have taken the steps to make the query simple and effective. It should be easy enough that even someone without a lot of computer knowledge and experience can figure it out. You don’t want to spend all day trying to sort out how to navigate their website or input your search details.

Typically, searches can be performed using name, city, zip code or state. This allows you more customization and the ability to filter out the results. If you have the proper information, you could narrow your search by quite a bit. There are many different reasons for searching for divorce records. The most important thing is to learn how and when to get the records you want.



By: Rose Quadee

About the Author:

Ross Quadee, the author of many articles regarding Various topics is working on
divorce records
and you can find free divorce records here. It’s fast and easy.